The Pirate Bay captures the file-sharing crown

It's often said that the fight against piracy is like a game of Whac-a-Mole, when smacking down one site just causes a few more to pop up. But The Pirate Bay is no average mole; the popular BitTorrent site is now the number one destination for file-sharing on the Internet, despite numerous attempts to sink it over the years.

The popular BitTorrent site The Pirate Bay is now the number one destination for file-sharing on the Internet

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It's often said that the fight against piracy is like a game of Whac-a-Mole, when smacking down one site just causes a few more to pop up. But The Pirate Bay is no average mole; the popular BitTorrent site is now the number one destination for file-sharing on the Internet, despite numerous attempts to sink it over the years.

TorrentFreak put together a list of top file-sharing sites, drawing on "several traffic comparison and analytic tools," including Compete, Quantcast, and Alexa.

The Pirate Bay has been the leading BitTorrent site for some time, but cyberlocker sites such as MegaUpload, Rapidshare, and Mediafire have proven more popular in recent years. These sites allowed users to download publicly-shared files directly through a browser, without using BitTorrent software. A major crackdown on cyberlockers, including the FBI's shutdown of MegaUpload last year, allowed The Pirate Bay to slide into the top spot.

That's not to say cyberlockers have completely faded in the file-sharing world. Lockers account for five of the top ten sites in TorrentFreak's list, including MediaFire in second place.

The Pirate Bay's operators have managed to stay ahead of the threats, moving servers and switching domains as needed. Instead of using hosting torrent files directly, The Pirate Bay now relies on magnet links, which provides some protection for users from legal threats. The site's operators have even shown a sense of humor about it, threatening at one point to launch airborne servers, and pranking its pursuers into thinking it had set up shop in North Korea.

If there's one bright spot for the entertainment industry, it's that music piracy declined over the last year, according to NPD. But the biggest reason isn't the endless fight against illegal sites, it's the rise of free, legal, ad-supported music services like Pandora and Spotify. Turns out the best way to keep moles underground isn't to use a better mallet, but to play a different game.